My sunday night soccer league continued tonight with our second game of the season. Coming off a tight 1-0 loss last week, we upped the pressure and intensity and walked away with a 4-4 result. I played goalkeeper for most of the second half and let in two but felt like I contributed well in the first half. Good game overall.

Wish I could say the same for the Galaxy. They recorded their seventh straight game without a win today as Sean and I watched from my house. At least their performance wasn’t as pathetic as last week but they still seem bereft of any good ideas and never look like a side that can cause major problems for opposition. Here are my thoughts on how to improve for the last eleven games of the season.

1. Drop Steve Cronin. He’s let in forty goals in nineteen games and it’s time to stop blaming the defense solely. Our defense is atrocious but a good goalkeeper can be relied on to sometimes make the big save and cover for those shortcomings. Cronin is often caught out of position and is indecisive when it really matters. His distribution is also pathetic. Backup keeper Josh Wicks looked brilliant in the pre-season and I’ve been reading nothing but good things about his performances in reserve games. It’ll kill Cronin’s confidence to bench him but enough is enough. Do it and let’s move on.

2. Stop playing Greg Vanney. He is useless. There’s no reason why he should start over Mike Randolph or even Michael Gavin. I know Dominguez and Roberts are higher in the pecking order but lacking fitness so it’s not the end of the world, but surely someone from the reserve squad could do a better job than Greg.

3. Stop being so nice to Beckham. He’s been slacking and the team is suffering. Maybe he’s not used to playing on a team that isn’t an automatic contender, but he seems to show up some games and phone in others. His long balls are becoming less accurate and he always pussies out on 50/50 challenges. When he cares, he’s the best player we’ve got but lately, he seems like someone just cashing a big check.

All is not lost. We’ve played well enough to believe that the post-season is not only possible, but ours to lose and a few lucky breaks will put us right back in the thick of things. I’ll be at the next game against Chivas where we can hopefully break this pathetic streak.